The "Return of the Jedi" of the series, except without Ewoks

By: daforce
Date: Sunday, May 06, 2007

I saw it today. A 9am IMAX showing.

And I liked it.

Was it the best of the Spidey movies? No. But it wasn't a retread (ala a certain Returns movie), it wasn't pointless and overacted (like a certain movie that took my wallet for a Ghost ride), and it was far from boring (unlike two separate trilogies that had Star power and Rings of influence in Hollywood).

The Sandman story didn't have enough to carry the movie on its own. Neither did the Eddie Brock story. Nor the Harry story, nor the MJ/Peter story. Frankly, if they went with just one or two of those storylines alone, you'd all be bitching about how little story there was in the movie.

The movie was fun. It was a bit slow in some places (pretty much every time Aunt May appeared), BUT those places were necessary to the plot and pacing of the movie. To the person(s) that didn't like MJ's singing...DUH! That was the whole point. She could act, but she couldn't sing. AND she ended up taking Peter's advice to better herself by getting a job that forced her to practice and perfect her singing. The movie just didn't spell that part out for the mouth-breathers in the audience, much to their dismay.

Also, if you haven't read a Spidey comic in the last, oh, forty or so years, you probably wouldn't remember that the comics dealt with multiple storylines pretty much ALL the time. They still do. If you can't handle more than one plot at a time, then grow smarter. If you want something with no plot, rent a video game or watch Daredevil.

A friend of mine put it best, this is the Return of the Jedi for this franchise. Not great, but not bad either and without those damnable Ewoks.

I did have one problem with the movie...the Gwen Stacy rescue scene. The crane is out of control, Spidey saves Gwen, the crowd applauds him, and then we cut to the next scene. Um, hello? The crane is still out of control, everyone's still in danger, can we finish the scene? Even if it ended with one of Captain Stacy's men shutting off the power to the generator.

Good action scenes, it was nice to see Spidey enjoy and take pride in being Spidey, it was nice to see Spidey not being hated by NYC in this movie (for a change), nice to hear Spidey quipping one-liners while fighting, nice to see Spidey doing Spidey moves (one armed hand stand, upside down hang, weaving through falling debris, etc.), and nice to see Peter Parker growing into the man that he's supposed to become. It was nice to actually look up at the screen in awe again and seeing a character in a well done live-action movie that I thought I'd never see except in my head.

All in all, I'll go see this again in the theaters, AND it'll wind up in my DVD collection right next to Spidey 1 & 2.

Rating: Full ticket price.

Click here to read the staff review by Mania.